


Scathed

by cat_77



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Episode Tag, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Missing Scene, episode 02.06, head case
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29715114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cat_77/pseuds/cat_77
Summary: The timeline for his little tale was about as far off as he had been himself the past few weeks (months).  This time, she was going to do something about it.
Relationships: Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell
Comments: 5
Kudos: 49





	Scathed

Dani said her goodbyes and made it nearly to the door on the far side of the bullpen before a thought crossed her mind: the timeline did not line up. Bright had fallen three stories, hit his head hard enough to slip unconscious long enough to solve the damned case, come to them with an actual human skull in his hands, stayed for the arrest, and then… By the time she and JT had finished in Central Booking, Bright was already back at the office, ready to give his report on his findings.

When did he have time to be treated for the undoubted laundry list of injuries he would have had from such a fall?

He had clearly splashed some water on his face, washed what he could and such, but still had been in his blood and who-knew-what-else stained suit with a distinct lack of hospital bracelet around his wrist when he told his outlandish tale. Even signing himself out against medical advice would have taken longer due to the necessary x-rays and everything else. X-rays she strongly suspected he did not have taken.

Thoughts of a long bath and a truly unhealthy dinner vanished from her mind to be replaced with the need to check up on him one last time. She turned on her heel with a sigh, the sergeant on duty barely raising an eyebrow at her as she made her way back into the thick of it versus making her escape. 

“Hey, Bright,” she called as she approached where she last left him. “When you said you were checked out, was that dream-you or real-you?” 

There was no verbal answer, but it turned out that she really did not need one. She had barely peeked her head back through the door when it no longer mattered if he had been seen before because he most definitely was going to be seen now. She found him with his hip braced against the table to steady himself, head clutched in his hands, one darting down just a little too slow to swipe at a drop of red that dripped from his nose.

“I’m…” he tried, but tilted wildly to the side before he could finish his usual nonsense.

“Going to go get checked out for real? Yes. Going to have the choice between an ambulance and one of us driving you? That depends on if you pass out before you get to the car,” she finished for him.

He lowered both hands to the table, one now with a smear across the back of it. “Yeah, a second, or maybe first, opinion might be warranted in this situation,” he grunted, pain evident in his tone.

He made it to the car, but that was mainly because someone had called Gil to help get him there. Thankfully, Bright managed to hurl outside of the car and away from either one of them. Not quite as good was the fact he hurled saliva only, which she didn’t know meant it wasn’t truly that bad or the idiot hadn’t eaten enough to come for a revisit. 

Bright took the handkerchief Gil offered him to dab at his mouth and looked more resigned than anything else when Arroyo told her, “I’ll meet you there. There’s one last thing I need to finish up first. Serial killers tend to up the paperwork, especially ones we missed for so long.”

This time, the timeline fit her expectations. There were x-rays and even a full CT scan and Gil bringing the good coffee and JT stopping by with hoagies for dinner. The diagnosis was expected, but was at least real this time. A truly decent concussion, cracked and bruised ribs of both the posterior and lateral type, strained tendons in his right rotator cuff and corresponding wrist, and the same for his right knee and ankle, which answered the question as to how he landed. Atop of that was a boatload of bruising, of course.

Bright still checked himself out AMA, but at least had a prescription for some pain meds that would not interact with his usual cocktail, and the rest of them had sound reasoning to keep him the hell away from the precinct for a few days. He’d protest and show up way too early anyway, which is why they told him a full week and expected him back in three days, but it was worth a shot. They wouldn’t argue keeping him there for the usual concussion watches because he had been up and around for literal hours after the fall with nothing more severe than the headache and bloody nose. That is to say that they tried, but the attempts were not successful. 

She drove him to his loft after he was once again attired in his filthy suit and dress shirt. Gil had gotten called back in to review something, and JT was sent home to his wife and baby. There was a group text between the three of them to try to figure out a way to keep their eyes on Bright for the night, and wasn’t ashamed to admit that she was tempted to call Mrs. Whitly herself to make sure they could get in if needed. She parked the car and moved to help him out of it, but he held up his hand in protest. He also did the thing where his eyes were a little too wide and he licked his lips nervously, so she ordered, “Okay, spill. And please don’t say that the giant vagina sculpture secretly held either another murder weapon or an extra body, because I don’t think my mind could handle that right now.”

He sighed, caught out, and pointed to something far more expensive than her own vehicle parked three ahead of where she had found a spot. “That’s Ainsley’s car,” he said, voice still not quite as steady as he would have everyone believe.

“And you’re going to try to convince me that this means you will not be alone because your hairbrained, easily distracted sister is totally going to watch over you and take care of you tonight?” she guessed. She offered him a doubting look knowing that he would normally hear it in her tone but wasn’t willing to bet he was firing on all cylinders at the moment.

He surprised her though, and shook his head. He instantly looked like he regretted the action, but he said, “Remember what I said about family stuff? If she’s here, I need to deal with it, and I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t want an audience.”

Dani bit her lip for the briefest of moments while she contemplated her options. Bright had been off his game for weeks, and she didn’t know if it was this family situation or something else. He seemed sincere though, more so than his usual brushoffs as of late. She could respect the need to keep some things closer than others, especially where family was concerned, and so she relented with, “Text me when you get up there, and promise you will text if you need anything?”

He agreed, far quicker than she would have anticipated, and she tried not to read too much into the look of relief across his features. She tracked him to his door and made sure he could manage the lock despite the near overwhelming want to also make sure he made it up the stairs on his own. Her text to Gil and JT with the updated plans was sent only to be immediately followed by a text from Bright that he had successfully made it inside. She would have left it at that, but one final glance showed her that the door on the street level wasn’t shut all the way, which meant she couldn’t guarantee the top one was either.

Bright’s luck tended towards the negative and so, despite knowing that Ainsley might check the locks when she left, Dani did not feel comfortable with such an obvious way in after how recently his apartment had been broken into. It wasn’t enough to just close the door and be on her way, so she made her way up the stairs herself to verify he was relatively secure for the time being. Voices drifted down to her and a little bit of her relaxed that it truly did sound like his sister and not some axe murderer out to get him.

The voices were muffled, but she swore she heard something that sounded suspiciously like the name Endicott. That made her pause. To say the man had been slime and had done a number on all members of the Whitly family was an understatement of massive proportions. He had disappeared right after having one of his goons stab Gil, only to be found months later with fate apparently catching up to him while he was on the run from that. It made sense that the family still had issues from him, and likely would for a very long time.

She turned to leave for real this time when she came to another stop at Ainsley’s next words: “I blacked out again.”

She sighed and hung her head. Of course even Ainsley had not gotten out of this unscathed. It had seemed that Endicott had focused on Malcolm and Martin but, really, the fact that Ainsley had called Malcolm home from Gil’s bedside had hinted even she had been hit with that asshole’s machinations. 

A few more pieces slid into place in Dani’s mind. Endicott had probably pulled something with the younger Whitly, something she hadn’t made public but was paying the price of all the same. Ainsley would loathe to have her image as the well-adjusted Whitly tarnished, but would still need to cope with the aftermath all the same. If she was blacking out, that aftermath was pretty severe.

As much as Dani wished to know more, she knew it was not her place. Trauma took time to cope with, to build defenses against, to move on from. She knew that from more than just her years on the force. The fact that Ainsley and Malcolm were talking about it was a step in the right direction. It would remain to be seen how the aftermath would fully play out – binge drinking like her mother or night terrors and copious amounts of medication like her brother – but at least now Dani had a little better idea what had been keeping Malcolm up at night. Beyond the usual, that was.

She thought back to how much closer the siblings had seemed lately, talking more, freely admitting their connection whereas before they kept it far more under wraps. Clearly, this was an ongoing thing, and something she could give Malcolm a little extra leeway to deal with for a while. She would make sure he knew she was there for him, as were Gil and JT and even Edrisa without a doubt, but let him choose to come to them versus pressuring him for the details. 

She had been wrong before and his increased level of Bright-ness as she had called it with Gil was not just about him, but about his family, something she had learned he was fiercely protective of. Whatever had happened with Ainsley had kicked that protectiveness into high gear and was undoubtedly the source of the weird vibes she had been getting for the past few months. With a man like Endicott, the possibilities were endless, and endlessly dire. She resolved to give the siblings some space, but also to keep an eye on them. There was, after all, a third option beyond the alcohol and drugs as to where that family could take their trauma, as Claremont proved without a doubt. 

She closed and locked the door behind her and headed to her car to make her way home, satisfied she had unraveled at least a little bit of the mystery that was Malcolm Bright.


End file.
